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World Cup in Besançon, 12 – 14 June 1999 The third leg of the 1999 World Cup was held in France again after a number of years of absence. 140 athletes from as far a field as Chile, Argentina and New Zealand gathered in Besançon to compete over a three day period .  The wall, which had been completely rebuilt after a fire, was short and the routes intense. Only Legrand and Koyamada managed to reach the chain in the semi-final, and notably Brenna, Hirayama and Zardini all failed to reach the final. This was won by Ovtchinnikov, followed by François Petit and David Caude. The Frenchman Jandenand, having started from the Open, finished in a fantastic 8th place. The women’s event had to be battled out in a superfinal between Muriel Sarkany and Katie Brown, after the favourite Liv Sansoz made a mistake and finished 7th, and Choumilova had placed 3rd. The American, after her disappointing experience in Lipsia, stole the show; Sansoz, Sarkany and Brown have each won a leg of this year’s World Cup – the final events in Milan and Kranj are bound to be interesting. Another great athlete, the Russian Ovtchinnikova, was plagued with bad luck this time. Having arrived too late for the competition because of delays at the airport, she tried to set the record straight in the speed competition. By far the fastest, she hit a large red hold instead of the bell and was disqualified. A European experience she’d probably rather forget. Hiryama in action at Besançon |
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| see Sarkany in action - a 30 second video clip of her in the semi-final | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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